-How did Gabriel García Márquez get that shiner? (via New York Times)

-The first rule of promoting Chuck Palahniuk's new book is: You do not talk about Chuck Palahniuk's new book! (ChuckPalahniuk.net via Bookninja)

-PopMatters reviews Sheridan Hay's upcoming The Secret of Lost Things (via PopMatters)

-Mitch Albom's secret? Keyboard shortcuts. (via Yankee Pot Roast)

*Update: Is The Namesake based on a man author Jhumpa Lahiri briefly dated? Probably! (via New York Magazine)

Posted by Graceanne at 02:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

-Celebrating W.H. Auden's centenary year, The Times publishes his critique of aspiring writers. Auden giveth, Auden taketh away. (The Times via Critical Mass)

-Was Mark Twain a sellout? (via Freakonomics blog)

-How do certain books get front of store placement in bookstores? The publishers' cold, hard cash. (TCF via Buzz, Balls & Hype)

Posted by Graceanne at 03:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Posted by Graceanne at 02:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

-For Austen, Nabokov, annotated editions mean content plus context (via The New York Times)

-Review of Bernard Cornwell's Lords of the North (via The Onion's AV Club)

-Interview with Jonathan Franzen, author of The Discomfort Zone (Deutsche Welle via The Literary Saloon)

Posted by Graceanne at 10:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

-For bestselling self help book The Secret, the secret is packaging (via MSN.com)

-Random House launches Browse & Search functionality on their website. Take that, HarperCollins! (via if:book)

-French literature professor: How to Talk About Books You Haven’t Read? (via The New York Times)

-Oprah will bring Mitch Albom's For One More Day to the small screen (via ReadersRead.com)

-Remembering author Philip K. Dick on the silver anniversary of his death (The Times via Bookninja)

Posted by Graceanne at 02:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

-Booker Prize winner Arundhati Roy returns to fiction (via Galleycat)

-Salman Rushdie set to teach at Emory University (via The Literary Saloon)

-Heart-Shaped Box author is Steven King's son (via USA Today)

-Novelist Elif Shafak endangered by her book (via Galleycat)

-Asian chick lit offerings multiply (via SFGate.com)

Posted by Graceanne at 12:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

-Why wonder about Anna Nicole Smith's death when you can read about the demise of Kurt Cobain in Take a Walk on the Dark Side?

-Speaking of Kurt, thriller author Joe Hill titled his new book Heart-Shaped Box...Who knew grunge would have more literary gravitas than disco?

-How lucky is 24-year-old Beasts of No Nation author Uzodinma Iweala, who recently inked a two-book deal with HarperCollins? (via Juneau Empire)

-Sorry, Da Vinci Code fans, but is the Facebook group "Dan Brown is a literary genius" for real?

Posted by Graceanne at 12:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

-Astro-nut lands book deal (via Galleycat)

-Judge prohibits O.J. from spending If I Did It advance (via Yahoo! News)

-National Book Critics Circle clash over racial themes of While Europe Slept (via The New York Times)

-Didion's The Year of Magical Thinking will hit Broadway (via NPR)

Posted by Graceanne at 12:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

-Iraq's National Library and Archive director blogs about Baghdad (via The New York Times)

-More Mom and Pop bookstores close their doors (via The L.A. Times)

-Audiobooks gain popularity among students (via U.S.A. Today)

Posted by Graceanne at 02:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

-Farewell, Molly Ivins (via CNN)

-Plagiarism, Canadian-style: Paul William Roberts (via Galleycat)

-Dissecting Martin Amis (via Slate)

-Les Liaisons Dangereuses holds key to memory debate (via The New York Times)

-Judith Regan-inspired roman à clef Because She Can (via USA Today)

Posted by Graceanne at 11:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

-The New Yorker considers Google Book search

-Edgar Award Nominees announced (highlight: A Death in Belmont by Sebastian Junger)

-National Book Critics Circle (NBCC) Award finalists announced (highlight: Rough Crossings by Simon Schama)

Posted by Graceanne at 12:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The perfect thing to lead you out of your food coma:

Booker-prize mania!

We are late announcing the National Book Award nominees, but here they are.

Little excerpts from the Gashleycrumb Tinies to help you get through the day.

Posted by andrea at 11:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Sorry for the hiatus. It's been rough on both of us, but that's all over now. I promise this time, to be better. More updates, more fun stuff, more information and commentary on what's going on in the book world.

For instance, The Millions notes that a number of big books are now coming to a theater near you. Aside from Running With Scissors, The Black Dahlia, and Hollywoodland, there's also rumors of The Adventures of Kavalier & Clay and The Corrections lighting up your life.

We here at Zooba wonder: What ever happened to Motherless Brooklyn? Ed Norton apparently optioned it "before it came out" -- so in 1999 -- and was slated to write, produce and star in it.

Now IMDB says the movie is slated to come out in 2007. Maybe...sorta...sigh.

Posted by andrea at 01:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I am over the whole Pluto thing. But in case you aren't, here are some astronomy books. Get them while they're cheap -- you know, before they become collector's items.

Last chance to register for the Three-day novel-writing contest.

Sound erudite: Learn to pronounce literary names with this convenient guide (courtesy of The Millions). Don't even pretend like you knew how to say "Ngugi wa Thiong'o" before.

Galleycat points to a Newsday article about a (purported) new trend of books encouraging people to be nice to each other. Who wants to be nice when you could be rich? Oh, and if you need a book to tell you to be nice to others...maybe you need more than a book.

Poppy Z. Brite talks about Post-Katrina New Orleans.

We wish we were in Florence right now. So does Rare Book News.

More from me when my own coffee kicks in.

Posted by andrea at 08:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)